The new media industry has revolutionised businesses, production and working life. Compared to industrialised labour where work was conducted in a factory along a production line, new media technologies has allowed labour to be performed anywhere in the world (Leong, 2011). The latest trend to take off in the United States of America is virtual media.
Many companies including Crayon and IBM are utilising virtual platforms such as Second Life to conduct regular meetings, conferences and company parties (ABC News, 2007). This new technology is allowing labour to be sourced from anywhere in the world. Silent Partner is just one of many leading websites that are providing the platform for business use in the virtual world (Silent Partner, 2010).
Opposed to the cost of a brick and mortar office which can cost thousands of dollars per annum, virtual offices are providing businesses with an inexpensive way to connect with their employees, contractors and clients from as little and $10 per week (Silent Partner, 2010). The employment of these technologies is also providing more freedom and flexibility to the employees. Gill’s study was conducted on 34 individuals working within the new media industry and identified that people working in the new media industry enjoy working with innovative technologies that focus on mass communicating (Gill, 2007, 16). Laura Noonan believes that media enhances our life instead of controlling it and I agree (Noonan, 2011). It is new media technologies such as virtual worlds that are allowing people to work anywhere in the world, limiting commuting time and allowing stay at home parents to work from home.
When you are sick, going to the doctors can be a time consuming and costly process, only to make you wish you were back at home in bed. This however can be solved at the click of a mouse. Yes, no more waiting time, no more paperwork and no more bills. As new media technologies vastly make their way into every nook and cranny of our lives, people are now turning to Google or other medical diagnosis sites for self-diagnosis.
Lewis’ report ‘Seeking health information on the internet: lifestyle choice or bad attack of cyberchondria?’ identifies that health and wellbeing is becoming more individualised and the internet is the only form of media that can “personally speak” to the user, providing a DIY approach to health information. At the click of a mouse your symptoms of a headache or dizziness can lead you to a self-diagnosis of a stroke or a brain tumour. So is this new media technology genuinely helpful or is it turning the average user into a cyberchondriac?
Horvitz and White, scientists at Microsoft’s research division conducted a study on the internet behaviours of more than one million users around the world. They came to the conclusion that laziness and lack of time is forcing people to turn to the internet in pursuit of self-diagnosis but more so, it is giving us an ‘acute case of the heebie-jeebies.’ I agree with Kristy De Git when she states in her week five blog (2011), “people don’t realise the impact media has on their lives with media intertwining with all facets of everyday individual life.”
Lewis, T. (2006) Seeking health information on the internet: lifestyle choice or bad attack of cyberchondria? Media, Culture and Society, 28(4), 521-539.
New media technologies are integrated into everything we do, work, rest, play, we now connect with friends, family and colleagues through mobile phones, emails, social networking sites and much more.
As Kate Leonard-Jones addresses in her Week 5 Blog, our heavy reliance on media to help us perform everyday tasks is so ingrained into our culture that it has become a part of us and our lives. Deuze (2011) states, “media is becoming invisible, persuasive and ubiquitous that people do not even register the presence of media in their lives.” New media technologies like these are blurring the boundaries between the producer and the consumer, where the content is produced by the ‘players’ themselves.
3D virtual worlds, such as Second Life are on the forefront of this new media development. Second Life allows people to escape their conscious reality by offering them the opportunity to live through a ‘second reality’ where the user is able to produce and consume the content to fulfil their wants and needs; which may not be attained in their conscious reality. This can pose problems and addictions for people that feel inadequate or low in their conscious reality. “As technology advances and life like virtual reality technology becomes mainstream, “addiction” to alternate realities is likely to increase exponentially (Conscious Living: Living in an Alternate Reality, 2011).”
Living in media is highly ingrained into our lives that we cannot seem to cope without it. Whether it is Facebook, YouTube, Twitter or Second Life; it seems as though we need to fulfil our ‘conscious realty’ inequalities with a ‘produced reality’, a second life.
Social media has provided people with a platform where like-minded citizens can network, and congregate to express their feelings, opinions and debate in the ultimate arena. Social media has changed the way we communicate to others and has enhanced our power to develop and change the opinions of others. This influential atmosphere has slowly caught onto the political communication bandwagon of leaflets, mass media and political debates. However, although we might think it’s the leaders utilising these viral networks to influence our opinions, it’s not.
Rasiej, (ABC News, 2010) states, “Nine out of ten videos watched during the 2008 presidential campaign that mentioned Obama and McCain were produced by citizens trying to influence each other, so the last people to arrive at the party were the Politian’s themselves.” It is social media that provides citizens with a platform to develop content and freedom of speech to influence opinions; Politian’s are just harnessing this outlet.
Sociologists Katz and Lazarsfeld (Shirky, 2011, 32) identified that there is a two stage process in the development of a persons’ opinion. The first stage involves the transmission of messages through mass media and the second stage involves the opinions to be resinated between friends and family members. It is this second stage that develops a persons’ opinion.
I agree with the ABC News (2010) broadcast when they identified that the accessibility of social networking sites, along with the freedom of expression and its billions of users make it the most valuable and powerful tool among citizens.
Tahlia Gregori states in her blog (2011),“the ability to talk instantly, easily and basically in synchronized conversation, has lead to an increase in collective action.” These sites can also backfire on politicians as they provide event planning tools which can be, and are utilised to congregate real world protests and rallies.
Reference
Shirky, C. (2011). The Political Power of Social Media: Technology, the Public Sphere, and Political Change in Foreign Affairs. Academic Search Elite, 90(1), 28-41.
Social media has provided people with a platform where like-minded citizens can network, and congregate to express their feelings, opinions and debate in the ultimate arena. Social media has changed the way we communicate to others and has enhanced our power to develop and change the opinions of others. This influential atmosphere has slowly caught onto the political communication bandwagon of leaflets, mass media and political debates. However, although we might think it’s the leaders utilising these viral networks to influence our opinions, it’s not.
Rasiej, (ABC News, 2010) states, “Nine out of ten videos watched during the 2008 presidential campaign that mentioned Obama and McCain were produced by citizens trying to influence each other, so the last people to arrive at the party were the Politian’s themselves.” It is social media that provides citizens with a platform to develop content and freedom of speech to influence opinions; Politian’s are just harnessing this outlet.
Sociologists Katz and Lazarsfeld (Shirky, 2011, 32) identified that there is a two stage process in the development of a persons’ opinion. The first stage involves the transmission of messages through mass media and the second stage involves the opinions to be resinated between friends and family members. It is this second stage that develops a persons’ opinion.
I agree with the ABC News (2010) broadcast when they identified that the accessibility of social networking sites, along with the freedom of expression and its billions of users make it the most valuable and powerful tool among citizens.
Tahlia Gregori states in her blog (2011),“the ability to talk instantly, easily and basically in synchronized conversation, has lead to an increase in collective action.” These sites can also backfire on politicians as they provide event planning tools which can be, and are utilised to congregate real world protests and rallies.
Reference
Shirky, C. (2011). The Political Power of Social Media: Technology, the Public Sphere, and Political Change in Foreign Affairs. Academic Search Elite, 90(1), 28-41.
Evolution and identity are embedded instincts within the human characteristic. Since the Stone Age, humans have formed identity around gender, race and tribal groups. To this day humans still form identity; however, technological evolution has allowed us to form and segregate our identities into more specific groups.
Personal music players are one form of technological advancements that have allowed us to understand a person’s identity through the music they listen to.Levy (2006) states, “the ubiquity of the iPod amplifies such concerns in the media and in Web sites like MySpace.com (where musical choice is as much a badge of identity as is gender or geography).” The idea of judging someone by their taste in music did not begin with the development of new media; it has just made it more accessible. This accessibility has led to ‘IPod Wars’ where two people (strangers, friends or colleagues) will compare their playlists to identify and categorise them by their music selections. These portable devices are now, more than ever, being utilised as an extension to one’s identity. This public display of music can develop or affect a person’s status in their social, work or family life. Levy (2006) states, “knowing the influence of a playlist, some people load up on “cool” songs in hopes of improving their social status.” This however raises the question:
Are people utilising these devices to plagiarise an identity?
The evolution of the internet has allowed people to instantly download the playlists of celebrities and other users in seconds. Levy (2006) states, “The IPod’s ease of use, combined with the internet, allows one to concoct a plagiarized personality from an undeservedly spicy playlist.” This accessibility aligned with the social status of playlists makes it easy to utilise a copied playlist to form an identity. Therefore, it is easy to identify that technological evolution with humans need to form an identity is sadly preventing people from portraying there true self to the world.
The development of social networks has provided users with a platform which one can connect with other users in a space where their identity is displayed and perceived through the utilisation of signs, symbols and the public display of connections. Donath states (2004) “online, identity is mutable and unanchored by the body that is its locus in the real world.”Users rely on these signs, symbols and connections to perceive the identity and/or status of that person. This however raises the issue of reliability, identity deception, self-consciousness and conforming to trends in the pursuit to ‘fit in’ or ‘belong’. Unlike the first world, where status and power can be identified through the constant tangible references of assets, titles and social ties; the second world requires intangible references including photos, language and connections to form what is believed as the users true identity.
It is the development of these networks and the ability to connect with any user that has formed the ability for users to cultivate a desired identity that can be played out in these milieus. Goffman’s development of identity-as-performance looks at the way users construct signs and language in these environments to emulate their performance (Pearson, 2009, p. 1). Long (2010, para 4) states “it’s in our best interests to present ourselves in ways that are well received by those people, and present ourselves differently to different audiences, based on assumptions we make about those audiences.”Therefore, every user is a number, an audience member, within a network of performers.
References
Donath, J., & Boyd, D. (2004). Public displays of connection. BT Technology Journal, volume 22 (4): 71-82. Retrieved from Queensland University of Technology Course Materials Database.
Pearson, E. (2009). All the World Wide Web’s a stage: The performance of identity in online social networking. First Monday, volume 14, Number 3. Retrieved from Queensland University of Technology Course Materials Database.
